Intermarriage in the Western Greek Colonies

Intermarriage in the Greek colonies in Italy and Sicily has long fascinated scholars, many of whom view the presence of Italian fibulae in otherwise materially Greek graves as the result of intermarriage between Greek colonial men and local, native women. A reconsideration of the evidence suggests that the hypothesis cannot be generalized for all the early colonies, particularly the Sicilian ones, where the nature of the evidence differs significantly. In Sicily, trade provides the most likely explanation for the presence of these objects in the colonies.